I personally like him as the Blood Knight. 'Bloody' is the title I might give a barbarian or brigand leader in an RPG, because to me it just means he spills lots of blood and probably gets it on himself. I like 'Blood Knight' because it gives him a sense of order, so that even if he isn't a part of a bigger group, he also isn't someone like the Joker.

Theme: Ashiís theme is pretty straight forward. Glancing at the card it is pretty obvious that the giant man eating worm theme hits the mark. But simply looking at the card is an incomplete way of judging theme. I advocate looking at how a figure plays and judging theme off that as well. Itís kind of blend of theme and playability. If you simply judge theme based on whatís on the card youíll end up with passive berserkers, and assassins that blindly run into the fray. Iíve seen both and itís always unfortunate. In Ashiís case I felt the play style fits with how a giant worm should play.

Creativity: Creating a stealth version of old powers like the original designers die with flying and stealth flying was a pretty ingenuous. Iím honestly surprised I havenít seen it more often.

Balance: Stand-alone melee heroes are by nature easier to balance than other heroes. Points killed is a much more telling factor than for most other figures. While points killed is a great factor to look at, it is not the end all be all. Ashi can affect your opponentís army placement, kill figures that are at important locations, and soak up a lot of attacks before going down. These factors donít always show up when simply looking at points killed.

I found that there arenít a lot of good comparisons to Ashi. There are some similarities to Kumiko.They both have similar surviveability relative to their points, and Ninjutsu Barrage and Devour play in similar ways. Ashi also has a little Hydra in him, but overall heís definitely his own unit.

The aspect of Ashi that had me worried when it comes to balance is Devour. Heroscape has always been leery when it comes to handing out auto kills. They make sure to counter balance auto kills by giving the figures other weaknesses. Grimnak has a low base attack, Atlaga can only use his once a game, Sudema, well her weaknesses are obvious and many. With Ashi you have a reliable auto kill, a respectable base attack, and solid survivability, but Ashi has many weaknesses as well. Ashi is a stand-alone, melee hero. This is one of the worst combinations in the game and doesnít need to be further elaborated on.

Ashi also has two other more subtle weaknesses. Ashiís movement value at only 5 leaves something to be desired. The jump from 5 moves to 6 might not seem like a huge jump, but not having the extra move hurts more than you would think. Now adding more moves to any figure is beneficial, but for Ashi and other stand alone figures not having it can be particularly difficult. When youíre only moving one figure, especially melee figures you have to be able to get them into a good position. If you canít do this then it might not worth putting an OM on them to begin with. There is a risk of them sitting in your starting zone the entire game.

The other weakness also deals with move, more specifically the 4 space and one 1 height limitation on Devour. It can be frustrating being engaged to a figure two spaces above you and not being able to devour them. Youíll have to be mindful where you position Ashi so that does not happen. The four spaces limitation can be even more of a hinder. Melee figures can move to spaces that are not in Ashiís devour threat range, but your opponent will be able to engage Ashi on their next turn. These limitations make it difficult for Ashi to be successful without supplementary figures.

All in all I felt his strengths and weakness balanced out well.

Playability: Ashi has an interesting combination of strengths and weaknesses. This causes Ashiís play style to be different than most figures. Ashi has trouble acting as a solo shark. As I mentioned in balance section, there are simply too many weakness for your opponent to exploit if he acts on his own. But if you play Ashi in the right situation or in the right army he can really shine.

I found that in most situations you canít chase the battle with Ashi. He will get overextended and out maneuvered. I generally liked using range figures to dictate where the battle takes place. That way you can unleash Ashi at the right time and the right place. This is similar to how Fen Hydra can be played. Ashi is usually the most viable in the mid game. If you wait until the end game youwon'tt be using Devour to its full potential. Use Ashi too early and you risk losing board control and Ashi being overwhelmed. Because of this and Ashiís many strengths and weakness I would classify Ashi as a swingy figure. What separates Ashi from other swingy figures is itís not luck that determines how well the figure performs, but rather how well you or your opponent plays. This can be true for most heroes, but I feel itís more apparent with Ashi. There were many times where I invested a OM early on Ashi only to place it in a poor position for the late game. Or midway through the round realized I should have invested an OM on Ashi. Ashi is not the straight forward hero he appears to be. There is a lot of subtleties you need to know to get the most out of him.

Conclusion: Thematic, looks good on the battlefield and fun to play, I vote to induct Ashi-Dhulu.

The other weakness also deals with move, more specifically the 4 space and one 1 height limitation on Devour. It can be frustrating being engaged to a figure two spaces above you and not being able to devour them.

By the way, the SUM is restricted by one space above the height, which would put you two spaces above from being engaged with that figure.

Before we pass around too many congratulations, Megasilver pointed out one feature of Ashi-Dhulu that infectedsloth was playing incorrectly. Given the review suggests that was one of the reasons he voted the way he did, I would like him to weigh in on the matter before officially counting his vote. I have sent him a PM.

The other weakness also deals with move, more specifically the 4 space and one 1 height limitation on Devour. It can be frustrating being engaged to a figure two spaces above you and not being able to devour them.

By the way, the SUM is restricted by one space above the height, which would put you two spaces above from being engaged with that figure.

The other weakness also deals with move, more specifically the 4 space and one 1 height limitation on Devour. It can be frustrating being engaged to a figure two spaces above you and not being able to devour them.

By the way, the SUM is restricted by one space above the height, which would put you two spaces above from being engaged with that figure.

The other weakness also deals with move, more specifically the 4 space and one 1 height limitation on Devour. It can be frustrating being engaged to a figure two spaces above you and not being able to devour them.

By the way, the SUM is restricted by one space above the height, which would put you two spaces above from being engaged with that figure.

I'm pleased that we changed the SoV policy to allow faction submissions, and I was excited to see our first set. Gnolls are a classic D&D creature and wholly fitting to add into Heroscape. Kinseth's take on them has potential.

I always purchase the figures to judge them for myself, and this time that turned out to be important. I was disappointed to discover that of the three squad figures, one of them is out of place. The D&D Gnoll Maruader figure is about twice the size of the two Pathfinder figures. The Pathfinder figures look great together, but the D&D figure does not fit them at all. I have the alternate sculpts too. The Gnoll Fighter is also much too big. The Gnoll Claw Fighter isn't too much larger, but it hardly looks like the same creature when compared to the rather similar-styled Pathfinder ones; it's head is at least twice the size.

The figure used for Ragsh is similarly-sized to the two smaller squad figures, except a bit larger and more imposing--perfect for a leader. Gruul is almost bizarrely huge in comparison, far larger than the Pathfinder figures. It's odd in that he doesn't fit with the others in terms of size or coloring (especially since he's an archer, not a front-line brute), but he's a hero so I could let that slide. Unfortunately, the poor match of the squad figures is a deal-breaker for me.

I didn't do a lot of testing, but overall I liked how they played. Pack Attack is difficult to use effectively against a decently-played squad army, but it can be pretty brutal against heroes. Warpath is an interesting, unique power, but unfortunately is so good that it's hard to justify putting Ragsh in harm's way until the game's later stages, especially with Gruul around. Gruul, in my testing, felt borderline underpriced. On his own he may be about right, but with free activations from bonding combined with the Cunning Shot and Pack Attack synergies, he's pretty brutal. More testing would be needed to be certain either way.

I vote to induct the Retchtongue Warband into the SoV.

Since the Retchtongue Warband is designated as the primary, the secondaries follow.

I vote to induct Ragsh Skullcrusher into the SoV.
I vote to induct Gruul the Wicked into the SoV.